Former U.S. attorney Shelby dies from gunshot wound

Former U.S. attorney's passion recalled

Published 5:30 am, Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Michael Shelby, shown in July 2004, said he resigned as U.S. attorney in order to better support his family and pay for his daughters' college educations.

Michael Shelby, shown in July 2004, said he resigned as U.S. attorney in order to better support his family and pay for his daughters' college educations.

Photo: Steve Ueckert, Chronicle File

Former U.S. attorney Shelby dies from gunshot wound

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Former U.S. Attorney Michael Shelby, a fun-loving free spirit with a passion for public service, was found dead at his home in northwest Houston on Tuesday of what authorities described as a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Shelby, 47, was suffering from cancer that reportedly had entered his spine. He had not been able to work in recent weeks because of the advance of the disease.

"This is a very sad day, but it's quite a legacy this man leaves," said Steve Dillard, head of litigation at Fulbright & Jaworski, where Shelby went to work a year ago. "He was genuinely loved and respected by so many people. He was a unique individual who will be sorely missed."

Shelby was appointed to head the prosecutor's office for the Southern District of Texas in late 2001. He left in 2005 because he needed to make more money to pay for his two daughters' pending college education, he told friends.

"I love government service, and I hope I'll be given that opportunity again someday," Shelby said at the time.

"He loved his job," said Harris County District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal, who worked with Shelby under former District Attorney John Holmes. "Mike had prosecution in his blood, the same way I do. When you experience the joy of helping people who have been victims and get to do something about the perpetrators of crime, it's so rewarding that it's intoxicating. But he knew how much (college) was going to cost, and he couldn't do it as a public employee."

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High ethics praised

Kent Schaffer
called him ethical and tough but never unreasonable. When he stepped down,
Dan Cogdell
said he was a tenacious prosecutor who got personally involved in important cases.

"He held his troops to no higher standard than he held himself," Cogdell said. "To the extent he didn't play games and pull punches, he'll be missed."

Shelby, a Naval Reserve intelligence officer who served in Operation Desert Storm, reportedly first suffered from cancer while living in Phoenix, where he moved in 1997 to work as a federal prosecutor, and lost part of a foot because of amputation. He returned to lead the Houston office in 2001, stepping down in June 2005 to go into private practice in Fulbright's white-collar-crime division. Shelby learned the cancer had returned in September, Dillard said.

In one of his last public appearances several months ago, Shelby, visibly ravaged by illness, delivered the keynote address at the investiture of his replacement and right-hand man, Don DeGabrielle, former U.S. Attorney Daniel Hedges recalled.

Shrunken by weight loss, his right eye covered by a bandage, Shelby was supported by his wife, Diana, as he entered the federal courthouse.

"He was in such obvious pain," Hedges said. "This guy was going to do this if they brought him in on a stretcher. It was ... remarkable."

"He was very cogent and articulate, but it was clear he was suffering," Martinez said. "Most of us — the vast majority — would have elected to stay at home."

He said that after that day, Shelby remained at home and had few visitors.

"Mike had pretty much decided he couldn't see people," he said, adding that Shelby was taking strong medication and his immune system was weakened, making him susceptible to infection.

Set the tone for his office

Hedges, local U.S. attorney from 1981-85, said morale in the office was good under Shelby, whom he described as a strong administrator.

"He was a guy of such strength and integrity that he obviously set a tone for the whole office," said Hedges, who was a member of the local screening panel that recommended Shelby to U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison as a candidate for U.S. attorney.

Shelby created an unusual award to recognize those in the U.S. Attorney's Office whose hard work otherwise would go unheralded, recalled Ed Gallagher, head of the office's organized-crime division. He named it the Sisyphus award, after the man condemned by the gods in Greek mythology to roll a rock up a hill time after time.

He once gave it to the office cleaning lady, explaining that it's important to recognize people at every station in life.

"She was in tears today as she was cleaning the office," Gallagher said.

DeGabrielle, who spoke briefly outside Shelby's home, remembered his old boss as a great orator, no surprise given his record as a champion college debater.

"He was one of the most effective, powerful advocates I have ever seen," DeGabrielle said.

Among the high-profile prosecutions undertaken during his administration were murder and conspiracy charges against those involved in the smuggling of five dozen immigrants, 19 of whom died when left in a stifling trailer in Victoria. He also oversaw the prosecution of River Oaks bookie Robert Angleton, who fled the country days before he was to be tried on charges that he hired his brother to kill his wife.

Inspired by 9/11

Shelby recused his office from handling Houston's most notorious case, the prosecution of
Enron
officials following the financial collapse of the giant energy company, because of potential conflicts of interest among so many of his attorneys.

Martinez said that the Sept. 11 attacks inspired Shelby to take a special interest in anti-terrorism. "He felt he was chosen to be U.S. attorney immediately following 9/11 to put in a system to make sure the community was safe," Martinez recalled.

On a wall in the U.S. Attorney's Office with photographs of previous U.S. attorneys, Shelby's stands out. Instead of a typical portrait, Shelby is standing over a desk with a copy of the 9/11 commission findings, Martinez said.

He said Shelby invented the name used by anti-terrorism task forces in every U.S. Attorney's Office in the country — Anti-Terrorism Advisory Council — and also helped write the guidelines used by all terrorism task forces.

Some of the things he did can never be told because of secrecy requirements, Martinez said.

Born in Luling, Shelby was raised in Houston and received his undergraduate degree in 1981 from Texas A&M University, which he attended on a debate scholarship. Three years later he earned a law degree from the University of Texas, where he remains the only student to twice win the Hildebrand Moot Court Competition.

Shelby began his career in the Harris County District Attorney's Office and moved to the local U.S. Attorney's Office in 1989. His eight-year stint there included the successful murder prosecution of religious cult leader Aaron LeBaron for his role in the killing of three cult defectors in 1988.

In 1992, Shelby ran for public office, losing a close race for a seat in the Texas Legislature to Kyle Janek.

Shelby loved skydiving and fast cars, friends said. Anyone who wandered by early to his office at the federal courthouse was likely to hear loud music — including Pearl Jam and Waylon Jennings — blasting from his stereo. Such informality did not extend to his work ethic, however. Thirteen-hour workdays were common.

"If you spent any time around him, it was impossible not to like him," Rosenthal said. "To me, Mike Shelby was one of those people who, because he was so robust and because of his age, I expected him to be at my funeral instead of the reverse. ... The world needed him for longer than we had him."